Description

Hello visitor and welcome to my virtual stereo system!

I am 39 year old physicist leaving in Amsterdam the Netherlands with a wonderful and understanding wife, a 5.5 years old daughter and a cat. I listen music all day every day (iTunes+Shure SE535 at work and KOSH at home). Currently, my favourite musicians are Patricia Barber and  Loreena Mckennitt, but I enjoy any genre as long as it is good music (from jazz and classical to pop, rock, and metal). My other hobby is drumming, though I do not play as much as I used to (i.e. 30-60 minutes per week).

Regarding my Hi-Fi believes, I am very found of Accuphase electronics, a firm believer in subwoofers, and do not believe all the hype about cables. With speakers it is more difficult! I was in a long term relationship with the Focal Utopia Micro Be & REL Stentor combo, then I was briefly in love with the Dynaudio C1 monitors. I have fantasised about Avantgarde speakers for a very long time, and till recently I did not find a dealer that was willing to let me audition them in my system. Currently, I own the Avantgarde Uno speakers, but as one would expect, now I have other fantasies, e.g. Avantgarde Trio, TAD CR-1 & Evolution E1, Marting Logan Summit X...

Finally, in case you wonder, I have named the system after ambassador Kosh Naranek (the vorlon in the Babylon 5 series) - a "metaphor" for the elusiveness, beauty and frustrations found in this hobby.

Thanks for stopping by and do not be shy, let me know your honest opinion about my system and hi-fi believes.

Happy listening,

Paul
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Room Details

Dimensions: 20’ × 12’  Medium
Ceiling: 9’


Components Toggle details

    • Accuphase A-65
    Class A power amp. It is rated at 60 watts in 8 ohm, and it doubles its power output all the way down to 1 ohm.
    • Accuphase C-3800
    Preamplifier
    • Accuphase DP-720
    SA-CD player.
    • MiniDSP DDRC-22D
    Room correction unit running Dirac Live.
    • Accuphase PS-1220
    Power conditioner.
    • Avantgarde Acoustic Uno G2
    Horn speakers with active subwoofers.
    • Kemp Elektroniks Cables and dedicated mains
    • GIK Acoustics Art panels (5) and Tri-traps (4)
    Acoustic panels and bass traps.

Comments 60

Showing all comments by aball.

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Hi Paul - Congrats on the A65! Maybe I should reconsider an A20
then....

My reference to current mode control is in describing the type of
feedback they use in their circuits. Most linear amplifiers use voltage
mode control for the sake of simplicity, but current mode offers a few
technical benefits that are worthwhile for those willing to break with
convention. For one, it has lower impedance which reduces phase
shifts significantly. Another is that bandwidth and gain are
independent. This latter is important for me (and perhaps you too)
because the gain reduction knob on an Accuphase is a real one - not
a shedding resistor used to to drop the signal. This allows you to
truly lower the gain of the circuit to better mate with your preamp
without affecting transparency. There are very few amplifiers that
have this ability.

Arthur

aball

Hmmm...well, pardon me for crashing the party here, but NVP, I wanted to say that I'd love to hear your system! I am a big fan of Amsterdam and try to go whenever I'm in northern France or Germany. Who knows, maybe we will connect face-to-face one day?

I almost purchased an A-20 but it didn't work out. I auditioned an E550 one time and wasn't very enthusiastic about it, but I realize now that auditions really don't amount to much, if anything. The champagne gold finish is interesting, all the more because I normally wouldn't go for that kind of thing, other than a Leben CS-300X. I keep Accuphase on the list because current mode control is a theoretically-excellent way to design an amplifier circuit, and yet is so rarely seen in reality. I use it all the time in the power supplies I design for its significantly-improved performance with those topologies.

aball